Sunday, March 27, 2011

I've had quite a few things on my table in the last few weeks, with more to come. The boys need pants, two bedrooms need curtains, a mitten needs a mate, a dress is half finished and two birthday parties on consecutive weekends. Today was the first of the birthday parties. My littlest's friend's fifth birthday. We got her a play set of moon dough and I made her a library bag too. She has a pretty name that I had not heard before we met her in September. I thought she might like something personalized so I put her name on the bag.

I made these bags on my very favorite vintage Singer, Aunt Millie. I cheated on the side seams and serged them, but really, I'm busy and I couldn't flat fell those because of the way the seams are layered at the bottom to square it off. You'll see that on the next bag. Inside the bag I made a little pouch for a library card. The top of it covers the opening so the card shouldn't fall out. The bag is a repurposed heavy canvas drop cloth. Aunt Millie went through it like butter I tell you. I don't even know how many layers but she didn't even sputter once. The handles of the bag are double layered canvas and quadruple layer cotton print. Like butter.
My computerized sewing machine would have taken one swing at those many layers of canvas and started crying like a baby. It starts beeping, the needle stutters and then stops and the screen flashes this message: "Stop for safety purposes." A workhorse, she is not.

This bag is for my older son's friend who is turning 8. She'll also be getting an ice cream dress but I'll share that later in the week. She also has a name that isn't common here so I made hers personalized too. I made this one more square at the bottom and less rectangle like Adhira's. It just gives it a different shape.

Hers has a library card pocket too. Both bags are tall enough to hold a rolled up beach towel and should machine wash just fine.

My little guy needed pants so I made him these from an O+S pattern. They are the Sandbox pants but he's a skinny string bean so I made the size 4 with the length of the 5's and they are still big in the butt. Oh well, they have a neat waist with an elastic at the back and a drawstring at the front so they fit him fine with room to grow. These are mostly upcycled like many of the things I make. The twill was a pair of my husband's work pants that he shrunk out of. The vehicles print was picked by his nibs. The other problem I've had with pants for my guys is the knees. They wear those out so fast! Crawling around and spinning on their knees on the carpet. I made a rectangle patch to put on the fronts of these to double the knees up in hopes they will last a bit longer. I think I'll have to do this to every pair from now on. Some of the Nature walk pants I made for them got holes in the knees within a month and the fabric quite was sturdy. At least the Nature walk pants are a little less complicated to make.
Anyways, size 5 slim sandbox pants.

The back pockets still need buttons but you get the idea. These were also made on my vintage Singer. Well, except for the finishing of the seams inside going down the legs. I serged those, but you see how busy I am right? I'm not making a vintage insipred garment so no need to flat fell this time. I literally finished these at the very last minute before the party. I gave my husband the pants to put on the boy so I could hop in the shower and he came to me a few minutes later with the safety pin that I had forgotten to remove from the drawstring.

Some knitting for good measure. We've had a really long brutal winter here. So long that it's still well below freezing at night. Early last week it was -21 over night and -10 in the sun during the day. I decided to start knitting a new wool hat and mittens for myself with hopes that by the time I finished it would be too warm to wear them. It looks like I might get my wish, but if not at least I'll have a nice new hat and mitts. The pattern for the hat is from Ravelry but you can find it here too. I really like it, it was a fun knit and I am using up the last bit of wool my mom brought for me from NZ. I've only made 1 of the mitts so far. The mate is in progress.

Do you see the owls? The hat has one with pink eyes and one with yellow. The mittens will be the same, one with pink and the other yellow. The wool is DK weight so this set is just right for "spring" here, which is really our second, slightly warmer winter.